Clove and Her Stupid Lullabies
by SilverAquaTrident
Summary: "Clove…what do you think of me?" I ask sheepishly. Clove lifts up her head. "Well…I guess you're not half bad." "Really?" I ask, maybe letting my excitement show a bit too much. "Yeah. Only like three-quarters bad." Clato One-Shot. For the August Starvation One-Shot Challenge prompt "Lullaby".


**A/N: Hey there! Thanks for clicking on this story, I hope you enjoy it. This is for Starvation's August prompt 'Lullaby'. Reviews and Favourites are appreciated, but I'm not gonna beg for them. Enjoy!**

**UPDATED AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hey everyone. I really appreciate those who have put this on Story Alert, but sorry, this is a one-shot. Thanks, though! If you want to read a multi-chapter Career story, check out my story _Queen, Protector, Warrior, and Serpent, _which is currently in progress. Enjoy this story, Lilac Alyssa Halliwell just Beta-read this, and she's a brilliant Beta Reader! :3  
**

I rest my hands over the top of the flickering flames, the glowing sparks warming my chapped skin. Bright shadows dance across the stony walls of the cave, illuminating our glum faces. I can hear rain pouring down on the roof, as if an obese giant is stomping on it. I let out a sigh. Honestly, could the Hunger Games get any duller?

Clove and I have been taking shelter in this pathetic, little cave for over a week now, and I swear the Gamemakers have begun to mess with the temperatures. During the day, if you even take one step outside, sweat immediately breaks out on your forehead. At night, even with the help of the clumsy fire Clove just created, we might as well be life-sized snowmen, wasting away as the drafts flow in and out of the cave. Worst of all, right now we're experiencing the coldest night yet.

See, one of the many things Clove and I have in common is that we get cranky easily. Clove has it a little bit worse when it comes to irritability, but when I'm in a bad mood, I usually feel like stabbing several thousand innocent creatures. And right now, we're both in one of those moods.

We haven't been all that happy since that idiot from 12 killed Marvel, and the extreme weather has done nothing to improve our mood.

So here we are now, resting by the fire, while Clove sulks. Her arms and legs are crossed so tightly that it seems as if she will never uncross them. Her lips are curled into something between a wild bear's snarl and a dog's smile. Her chocolate brown hair is greasy and matted, probably because we've only bathed twice since entering the arena.

"Clove, why do you scowl so much?" I blurt out. I immediately regret it, as her icy blue eyes pierce me like daggers. Seriously, that girl has mastered the art of glaring.

"I don't. It's just that with you around, I have more reasons to."

I roll my eyes. "Wow, Clove. Always optimistic. Just remember, within a matter of days we'll both be back home in Two, where we'll have endless riches and can live together until we die."

Clove's scowl fades a bit, though it doesn't disappear entirely. "You know, you had me excited there until you mentioned the part about living together. That's when all my optimism evaporated into thin air."

"As if you had any before?"

Clove laughs. "Shut up. Well, I'm bored. We should…what should we do?"

I smile, glad that Clove's deathly glare is completely gone. "We could…play truth or dare?"

This earns a grin from Clove. Back home, when we lived at the Career Academy, we used to round up a large group of friends and hold mass games of Truth or Dare in my room at midnight. I can tell she is remembering one of those nights. Nights that often ended with red cheeks, fits of laughter, crappy food we stole from the kitchen, and more often than not, an unconscious person or two.

"Yeah. Yeah, that'd be great. You ask first."

Ah, yes, I've done it. Her bad mood has disappeared without a trace. "Okay, then. Truth or dare?"

Clove raises her eyebrows. "Cato, you know what I'm gonna say!"

She has a point there. Never, not once, has Clove answered 'Truth'. I wrack my brain for some good dares. You pick up quite a few when you live at the Academy, but we've already used most of them. I need to dare her to do something that will embarrass her, something that will make Panem laugh…

"Sing me a sappy romantic lullaby. To the tune of 'Rockabye Baby'. And it has to rhyme."

"What?"

"You heard me."

Clove shrugs. "I've done worse. Okay, but really? Does it have to be romantic?"

I nod vigorously, smirking, then curl up and rest my head on her lap.

"What are you doing?" she asks quickly, recoiling slightly.

"Dramatic effect."

"Ah," Clove nods and relaxes. She knows what I'm talking about. In District 2, we are all about dramatic effect.

"Okay, well, I'll give it a go."

I look up in anticipation. Clove's singing voice is really good, sweet and low with some vibrato. It kind of has a calming effect…

"Rockabye, Cato, on the tree top.  
So I can kill you easier with a mop-"

"Hey!"

Clove laughs. "What? You deny my fantastic songwriting abilities?"

"If I were a baby, I'd be sobbing right now! Come on, at least make it rhyme! And it has to be romantic. Oh, and stroke my hair, it feels good."

Rolling her eyes, Clove takes another breath, running her hand through my blonde hair repeatedly in a comforting motion.

"Rockabye Cato, on the tree top,  
I really love you, and I'll never stop-"

"Yeah, that's what I'm talking about!"

Clove slaps my face so hard that it vibrates and then keeps singing.

"I am just kidding, you really suck. I caught you mating with a duck."

I raise my eyebrows, amused. "Mating with a duck? That's the first rhyme you thought of?" I laugh in disbelief.

"Hey, I could have rhymed 'duck' with something worse!"

"Touche. Now sing me another lullaby to the tune of…do you know that pre-Dark Days song 'Safe and Sound'?"

Clove nods suspiciously. "Um…yeah. It was written by that girl…what was her name…Sailor Twift?"

"Something like that. Sing me another lullaby to the tune of that song. And this time, you have to kiss me afterwards."

"WHAT?!"

I laugh, enjoying Clove's reaction. "What, aren't you too cowardly to refuse a dare?"

"Ugh, fine."

I knew that would work. According to Clove, the deadliest sin you could ever commit is to refuse a dare. To be honest, the real reason why I included the kiss wasn't to embarrass her, it was because I…

You know what? Never mind.

Clove takes a deep breath.

"Just close your eyes,  
or else I might hurt you now.  
You'll be alright  
Just kidding , you're going down.  
You're really hot, baby,  
I'm saying that 'cuz you made me  
Come morning light, you will not be  
Safe and sound."

Well, I'll admit, Clove's pretty good at improvisation. But now, I'll have to see if she's as good a kisser…

"What are you waiting for?" I ask sheepishly, leaning upward toward her face.

"For you to man up."

And with that, Clove leans down and smashes her lips into mine. The feeling I get is warm and airy, like I'm running through a meadow, like I'm a giant balloon, like someone just poured liquid gold into me. I feel on top of the world. Her lips are warm and full, and even though it was a dare, it seems…real. I want to freeze this moment and live in it for eternity, just me and Clove, kissing inside a moldy cave.

Clove pulls away gently, blue eyes staring into mine. They glow in a way I've never seen them before, like someone just electrified her irises. I'm not quite sure, but did I just see a flicker of…tenderness? I've never seen tenderness in her before. The only emotions I've ever seen in her are things like rage, annoyance, sadness, jealousy, happiness, excited, and gloating, but out of the ten years I've known her, I've never seen tenderness cross her face. It was almost as if…she loves me.

No, no. She can't love me. She's Clove, and I'm just…Cato.

I grab a rabbit bone and gnaw on it to distract myself from these stupid sappy thoughts.

"So, how'd you like it? Your first kiss, I mean."

Clove immediately returns to her normal smirking self. "You tasted like dog crap."

"You've tried dog crap?"

"Now I have. But what did you think?"

Nervousness runs through me. She can't know. She can't know about the secret I've been keeping from her all these years…

"It was mildly decent."

Clove shrugs, satisfied. "Good enough."

A long pause strikes, the silence seeming to echo through the cavern's walls, the only voice being the rain splattering above us. I have to ask her, this could be the last day I see her. I can't go on forever not knowing. I need to ask, right now.

"Clove…what do you think of me?"

She lifts up her head. "Well…I guess you're not half bad."

"Really?" I ask, maybe letting my excitement show maybe a bit too much.

"Yeah. Only like three-quarters bad."

My adrenaline lowers slightly. I guess she doesn't like me after all.

"Three-quarters bad is more than half bad, Miss Braniac."

"I like bad people," she elaborates.

I pause again, trying to decipher the meaning of what she just said. So she likes bad people…and I'm a bad person…so maybe…

Clove speaks up again. "Cato…um…remember when we…um…kissed?"

Her cheeks turn a light shade of pink. I laugh. "No, Clove. I have amnesia and I can't remember what just happened two minutes ago."

Clove's cheeks turn even redder. "Haha, very funny. Um…I was wondering…do you want to try it again?"

I nearly spit my rabbit bone across the room. She likes me…this means she actually likes me…

"Okay."

I lean forward and kiss her again, wrapping my arms around her waist, but this time that warm feeling is much more prominent. I can feel the energy passing between us. Warmth spreads through me, tingling through my spine. Clove loves me…she loves me…it sounds really stupid, but I feel better than I've ever felt before.

But then it hits me, like someone punched me in the gut, like someone popped my shining moment like a bubble. I have to tell her…she deserves to know.

Clove senses my sudden distress; her lips tense up and she pulls away, though her arms are still wrapped around my neck. "Something wrong?" she asks, her lips inches from mine.

"I…I have to tell you something."

Her smile fades to confusion. "Um…okay. Whatever it is, spit it out."

I stare down at my feet, avoiding her eyes, "I loved you since we were eight."

Clove's eyes widen, than she laughs with pleasure. "Cato, when we were eight, I nearly killed you with a pair of scissors!"

Ah, yes, I remember that day. When you turn ten, you have the option to go away to a boarding school to train to be a Career until your last Reaping. It was my first year, and we were setting snares in the training room with scissors, rope, and boards of wood. A girl was making her snare next to me, and it turned out that her snare was the best out of all of ours. The instructor was really impressed, and the girl seemed really proud of it. I applauded along with the rest of the kids, and then the instructor said we could all take a bathroom break. The instructor left, along with most of the kids. I was just getting up when I tripped over an inconveniently placed wooden board. And I just happened to fall right into the girl's snare. Long story short, I knocked over a piece of wood that was really important and the snare collapsed, but not before the snare caught me and the rope strung around my leg. So there I was, lying face down on the floor, tied to a snare while the girl yelled at me about ruining her snare that she worked really hard on. She attacked me with a pair of scissors, and I fought back with a small wooden board. The fight beat both of us up pretty badly. We ended up in a month's detention, and the girl and I ended up becoming best friends in those long hours after classes. That girl was Clove.

"Well, yeah, but that's not the confession. You know how you had that boyfriend Marcus?"

Clove nods affirmatively. "Yeah, I remember him. We were in our sixth year, right?"

"Yeah. And…he broke up with you. Well, he didn't really break up with you. I…I…I sort of got really jealous because I liked you. And…I kind of…um…"

"Blackmailed him into breaking up with me?"

I gasp. She knew all along. She knew about that terrible thing I did! When I threatened Marcus into breaking up with Clove, I knew it wasn't the worst thing I've ever done, but I betrayed Clove by doing that. I've done my fair share of awful things, yet that one has stuck with me from two years ago up until now.

"How did you know?"

Clove shrugs. "I have my ways. It's all right, he was no good anyway. I was planning on dumping him the day after."

I feel as if a giant fifty-pound weight has just been lifted off my back. There was no need to sweat it, she wanted it to happen…

"I love you."

I blurt it out before I can stop myself. Clove gazes at me, smiling.

"Cato, you suck. You're the worst person I've ever met." She begins to ramble, "You're conceited, stuck up, arrogant, twisted, awful, and revolting in every way. But I love you too."

She finishes with a smile.

"Well, that makes a lot of sense," I reply.

Deep down inside, I'm actually not being sarcastic. It makes perfect sense. I know Clove. I know the way she thinks and how she operates.

She means that I am an awful person, but she loves me despite that. And I don't think I could ever find another girl who could love me with my flaws.

I crawl into my sleeping bag and she crawls into hers, and we stare up at the moldy ceiling like we have every night for the past few days. Except one thing's different.

My hand is outstretched, intertwined with Clove's.

I close my eyes and smile to myself, because I know that I will always remember this moment, that awful yet brilliant moment with Clove and her stupid lullabies.


End file.
